[fic] last night i dreamt an emo kid loved me [brendon/spencer; r]
last night i dreamt an emo kid loved me
brendon/spencer, with some ryan/keltie and background jon/cassie. r. 8132 words.
thanks to wishpaper and chopsticknoodle for looking this over, and dreamofthem for grooming this thing into consistency. Title from a Good Clean Fun song; cut text from a Decemberists song.
Brendon says, "Spencer, Spencer, you'll spare my life, right?"
"Yeah, of course," Spencer says. "We're a team. A team Ryan's not a member of."
"There's only three of us, come on," Ryan says, just as the match starts. "That's not cool."
Brendon says, "Maybe if you weren't the undisputed champion or something, we might go easy on you."
Ryan says, "You're just jealous."
"Maybe you're just jealous because you're going to lose for once," Spencer says. "Keltie isn't here to save you now." (Ryan refuses to admit it, but Keltie's even better at Halo than he is.)
Brendon beams, singing, "You're just jealous 'coz we're young and in love."
They're playing Halo 3, and Ryan says, "God damn, why don't you guys just go get married already."
Brendon grins, jabbing Spencer in the side with his elbow. "Hey there, Spencer Smith, what do you say? I think it's a pretty good suggestion."
With a shrug, Spencer says, "Yeah, sure. Why not?"
Brendon says, "What?"
Ryan covers his face in his hands. The announcer in the game says, headshot! Then, double kill!
Brendon says, "Son of a motherfucker."
Spencer looks smug.
The announcer shouts, killing spree!
-
Ryan calls Keltie, and she comes over and wipes the floor with the rest of them.
-
Ryan says, "I think we should start on the new album."
"Without Jon?" Brendon says.
"Oh. Right." Ryan says, "So what else do you guys want to do?"
Spencer says, "I'm not getting high with you guys again."
"What the fuck? I wasn't going to suggest it, shut up." Ryan's laying across the couch, head on Spencer's lap and not a pillow because Spencer's a jerk who refuses to move.
"I know you, dude," Spencer says, bouncing his leg. "You were."
Ryan scowls for a moment, before reaching up to punch Spencer in the shoulder. "Like you have any better ideas."
Brendon says, "We could go to a bakery, see how much Spencer and mine's cake's gonna cost."
"Spencer and mine's?" Ryan repeats, incredulously. Then, "What cake?"
"Our wedding cake, duh," Brendon says.
Spencer raises his eyebrows. With a barely-restrained smile, he asks, "We're getting married?"
"You agreed, Spencer, don't turn your back on me now."
Spencer drums his hands against his thigh, then tilts his head a little to the side. He looks from Ryan to Brendon, then says, "Did you know Wal-Mart makes wedding cakes?"
"Sweet." Brendon says, "We're going to have the classiest wedding ever, Spencer."
Ryan says, "I haven't gotten my invitation yet." He says, "Brendon, did you even bother to ask Spence's parents for, you know, your future wife's hand in marriage?"
"Wait, why am I the bride?" Spencer says. "I'm not bride material. I have a beard." He rubs at his neck, lifting his head up to better display the fuzz there.
"That's not a beard. That's just ugly."
"Hey," Spencer says. "It's better than you can do."
"Shut up."
-
Brendon and Ryan and Keltie and Spencer have a four o'clock flight to Chicago. Ryan spends the hour's wait at the airport trying to argue the gate attendant into switching seats around to let him and Keltie sit together. Keltie just laughs and shakes her head, sitting in the airport chairs with Brendon and Spencer.
"He booked our tickets really late," she says. "As in, last night-late."
"I give him forty five more second before he pulls out 'but I'm famous' as a reason to get to sit next to you," Brendon says.
Ryan manages to get a seat right in front of Keltie's, which puts him soundly in front of business class. He spends most of the flight talking about how comfortable he is, and how much more comfortable he'd be if his girlfriend had gotten the seat next to him.
Brendon bought tickets for himself and Spencer over a month ago.
-
Ryan and Keltie have a whole suite, but Brendon and Spencer just have a cramped little room with two twin beds. They could have afforded separate rooms, but why bother, it's not like they need much space. They're not staying long.
Brendon tosses his bag onto the bed nearest the door, digs through it for his pajamas -- he has two days' worth of clothes, one for tomorrow and one for the plane ride the day after, and he brought pajamas. They're cotton and covered in sheep.
Spencer says, "Seriously?"
"I like to live in comfort and style, what can I say."
-
"Today is the day, Spencer Smith. Rise and shine. It is time to face destiny!"
"It's not our destiny, christ, shut up, what time is it," Spencer mumbles, not really asking a question.
"Time to get up," Brendon says. He's already in his suit, hair a little damp from his shower. Spencer gets up to take a shower, but. First he adjusts Brendon's collar, because part of it is turned inside out. Brendon cocks his head to the side, questioning, and Spencer just shrugs and goes to get himself ready.
After Spencer's out of the shower and dressed, while he's doing his hair, Brendon sits on the bathroom counter and kicks his feet, singing old 504 Plan songs.
Spencer says, "Shouldn't you be doing something else? I'll be ready in a minute."
"Like what?" Brendon says, but he slides off the counter, puts his hands in his pockets.
"Are you seriously done getting ready?"
"I got up early," Brendon says. "Couldn't sleep."
"It's not like it's your wedding."
Brendon shrugs. "I'll go watch TV."
"Right."
Brendon looks down, then back up, expression shifting like he's steeling himself for something, but all he does is take a step forward, and readjusts Spencer's tie. He tugs it a little tighter, straightening it, smoothing it flat. "There," he says, and disappears back into the main room. He turns the volume up high, watching cartoons.
It takes Spencer more than a minute before he finishes up on his hair.
-
"Spencer, Spencer," Brendon whispers.
Spencer raises a finger to his lips, shakes his head just the slightest bit. Brendon slumps down in the pew, then remembers himself and sits up tall to peer around the giant hairdo of the woman in front of him, some Midwestern relative of Jon's. Maybe a great-grandmother. She's old and reminds Brendon a little of his own relatives, in that she smells like flowers and laundry detergent and whatever it is that makes old people smell old.
His feet are bouncing.
Spencer kicks his ankle, and Brendon looks at him. Spencer just rolls his eyes.
Brendon really likes weddings. He can't help being enthusiastic. They just. Make him more energetic.
The whole wedding, Tom's been hiding behind his camera. He's allowed, though, since he's the official photographer. Word is, Jon's even paying him. Jon knows how much film development can cost, and apparently there was a whole conversation about whether Tom'd shoot digital or analog. Analog won out. Tom even has a light meter with him, and is metering and adjusting for half the shots he takes.
Brendon maybe reaches for Spencer's hand when Jon and Cassie take their vows. Just maybe.
Spencer maybe squeezes Brendon's hand back. They don't look at each other.
Brendon says, "My dinner is better than yours."
Spencer says, "What? What even is that?"
"It's better. And that wasn't a sentence, Spencer Smith," Brendon says. "Away to the grammar gulag with you."
"It was a sentence. There was a subject, an action, and a verb."
"It was a malformed question," Brendon says. He says, "Anyway, we're gonna have vegetarian entrees at our wedding, Spencer. Our wedding is going to kick this wedding's ass."
Ryan says, "Guys, shut up," because Jon's dad has just stood up to make a speech.
Brendon drinks a lot of champagne.
He whispers, "Let's go, let's go, let's go," to Spencer, when the dancing starts, and Spencer is probably a little tipsy also, says, "But Brendon, I'm not wearing my dancing shoes," and they go dance anyway.
Pete steals Travis' spot as DJ to announce that it is totally time for married couples to get their motherfucking groove on, okay, so I'm going to turn this shit back over to Travis, actually, because me and Patrick are going to tear shit up on that dance floor, seriously and there's a lot of tittering from Cassie's half of the wedding party.
So Spencer starts to leave, but Brendon says, "Spencer! Spencer Smith. We will keep dancing. All night. This is my solemn vow, to carry on dancing. Don't leave me dancing by myself, Spencer Smith," and Spencer doesn't leave, by some miracle.
So.
Brendon may or may not lean on Spencer. "It is time to slowdance, Spencer Smith," he says.
He definitely presses his face into Spencer's shoulder. Spencer's hair is a little long again, sort of scratches against Brendon's face. It smells clean, with the slightest hint of honey, maybe. Sweetness and warmth is what it boils down to. Maybe Brendon's projecting.
He says, "I want to be married, Spencer Smith."
"No you don't. You want to be in our band."
"Jon Walker isn't leaving the band."
"No," Spencer says. "That's because our band kicks ass."
Brendon says, "I won't leave." He's talking as low as he can. The music isn't up too high, thankfully. "I wouldn't."
Spencer walks off. Brendon lets him go, doesn't quite follow as he wanders off the dance floor.
Brendon leaves late, and Spencer is already asleep when he gets back to their hotel room, curled up on his bed, on top of the covers.
Brendon lays on his own bed for a while and stares up at the ceiling.
In the morning, he wakes up curled around Spencer and doesn't remember when he moved to get there.
Spencer doesn't really smell like anything except maybe sweat, a little. Brendon kisses the back of his neck, just -- because. He doesn't think about it.
He falls back asleep.
When he wakes up again, Spencer is in the shower. Neither of them says anything.
Later that day, Brendon says, "Spencer, do you ever want to get married?"
"I don't know," Spencer says. "I guess. Maybe."
Brendon says, "That's good."
Spencer's head hurts, and the noise from the traffic isn't helping. He watches the passing cars. "I guess."
Brendon says, "Our wedding would kick ass. If we had one."
Spencer snorts, says, "Hey, we've got the walk sign, come on."
On the plane, while it's taking off, flying them back to Vegas, Brendon reaches for Spencer's hand again, leans his head against Spencer's shoulder. He says, "Spencer Smith."
Spencer's eyes are closed, and Brendon's not sure if he's asleep yet or not. He kisses Spencer on the cheek. Later, when he drops his head to Spencer's shoulder again, Spencer's head lolls sideways so it's resting against Brendon's.
Brendon manages to pretend he doesn't notice hard enough that he falls asleep, too, and doesn't wake up again until the plane touches land in Vegas.
-
Brendon spends three days catching up with old friends before getting bored again, and calling Spencer.
"Hey, Bren," Spencer says. "I was about to call you, but Ryan just called."
"We're losers," Brendon says.
"Codependent ones, apparently," Spencer says. "So what's up?"
"I'm bored. Come watch Disney movies with me, Spencer," Brendon says. "We can get Chinese and watch movies, and it'll be awesome."
"Alright. We gotta get something for Ryan, too; don't want him feeling all left out."
"Right, right," Brendon says.
-
Ryan says he'll be there in half an hour, so Spencer and Brendon sit around and wait for him. Brendon says, "We could get Chinese."
"We just did, dude, the fuck?"
"No. For the wedding, duh," Brendon says.
"Dude, Chinese food at a wedding reception?"
"It's delicious," Brendon says.
"We're not getting it from this place, anyway," Spencer says.
"Of course not, no, this place sucks. We'll get. Like. Gourmet Chinese. It'll be the shit." He says, "Besides, we're celebrities, we're allowed to be all nontraditional."
"Right, right," Spencer says. "Man, we can get fucking -- General Tso's chicken. Best food dish ever."
"No, come on, half our friends are vegetarian. And I cannot condone serving dead animals at the reception, Spencer Smith, that's just cruel and unusual."
"But it's so fucking good."
"No, seriously. No General Tso's. Unless it's, like, General Tso's tofu."
"Do they do that?"
"I don't know. They should, though."
"We can force them to," Spencer says.
The door opens -- Brendon left it unlocked, because it's easier than having to get up and open it in the middle of dinner. Ryan says, "Hey, what's up?"
Spencer says, "Do they make, like, General Tso's chicken, only with tofu?"
"What? I don't know," Ryan says. "Why?"
"We're trying to figure out if we can get it at the reception," Brendon says.
"Are you guys seriously still talking about that?"
Brendon and Spencer both shrug and look back down at their food, and pick up their forks to eat in unison.
"Seriously, let it rest. It's getting kind of old."
"Our love will never get old, Ryan Ross."
Ryan rolls his eyes. "So what'd you guys get me?"
-
The third night in a row that Spencer sleeps over at Brendon's, Brendon says, "You might as well just move in, you're here so much."
"Oh, sorry," Spencer says. "I'll get my stuff together in a minute."
"What?"
"I'll just, you know, get my stuff together and head home, you know? I've been staying here too much, you're right."
"I never said that," Brendon says. "I said you might as well just move in."
"Oh," Spencer says. "But you won't have a guest room anymore."
"That's why man invented the sofa bed."
-
"Good morning, Ryan Ross," Brendon sings into the phone. "I need help."
"No. It's three AM. Is this an emergency?"
"It is! Ryan, Ryan, what color tuxedo should I get?"
"Black," Ryan says. "Now shut up and let me sleep."
-
He says, "Black? You're sure?"
"What the fuck -- it's five in the -- fuck you. No, Keltie, everything's fine, go back to sleep."
"Do you think we can get orchids this time of year?"
"What -- I'm hanging up now."
Brendon scowls and calls Pete. Pete is a lot more enthusiastic.
-
When Ryan comes over, which he inevitably does, he says, "Why did NME call me at nine in the morning?"
"What?"
"Why are British music journalists calling me about you and Spencer getting married at nine o'clock in the morning?" Ryan says. "The only people allowed to wake me up at nine in the morning are Spencer, if there's something important, or Keltie, if she's going down on me. Otherwise, no. So what the fuck."
"Oh," Brendon says. "Uhm. What are we talking about?"
"Your pretend wedding. Have you been telling people, or what? Seriously, it was funny at first, but like. What?"
"I might have called Pete," Brendon says.
"Pete's smart about press. Pete wouldn't leak that shit."
"And, uhm. And maybe Gabe." Gabe was even more enthused than Pete, when Brendon called.
"Christ."
-
So there's a stupid little blurb in NME the next week, about how Panic!'s still on hiatus but finding ways to occupy their time with their bassist off in foreign lands.
-
Jon and Cassie get back from Santorini, only 'get back' means they're in Chicago, and the band's still on this temporary hiatus, and Brendon's getting antsy. Brendon's writing songs on his own, recording them track by track and mixing them on his computer and sending them to Patrick via e-mail.
He writes, pstump make it better ok.
Apparently, that's reason enough for Ryan to call and say, "Hey, Brendon, what's up?"
"Nothing," Brendon says. "I went grocery shopping!"
"Are you okay?"
"Why would -- what?" Brendon says. "Yes?"
"Pete said Patrick told him you're being emo."
"I wrote some music," Brendon says. "And sent it to Patrick for advice."
"Oh," Ryan says. He shouts, "Pete, stop being a dumbass! Tell Patrick to do the same!"
There's a lot of noise on the other end of the line, all of a sudden. Lots of thudding. Brendon's pretty sure he hears Pete shouting something about how, "I'm the only person allowed to call Patrick a dumbass, Ross!"
"Don't die, Ryan," Brendon says before hanging up. He's pretty sure Ryan doesn't hear him.
-
Brendon says, "Keltie, Keltie, when should our wedding be?"
"Have you been drinking?"
"No," Brendon says.
"Are you high?"
"Maybe a little," Brendon says, huffing into his phone's speaker. "C'mon. When should we get married? I kind of want a winter wedding. With snow. In the north. The north, Keltie."
"We're not getting married, Brendon," Keltie says, her tone light. "Go to bed."
"No, not our wedding," Brendon whines. "Me and Spencer. When we get married. I want swans made out of ice, Keltie, do you think Spencer would like swans made out of ice?"
"I don't know. Hold on." The sound goes tinny and muffled as Keltie shouts, "Hey, Ryan, does Spencer like ice sculpture?" Then her voice is clear again. She coughs. "You could talk him into it, I bet."
"Oh, good," Brendon says. "Because I want ice swans."
"Brendon, sweetie," Keltie says. "Go to bed."
"Okay. Okay. I'm going to put a record on first. A good one."
"Okay, Brendon. Good night."
"Good night, Keltie. Go have a fulfilling evening with Ryan Ross."
"Okay. Good night."
"And use --"
Keltie hangs up.
-
Brendon is starting to hate having time off. He hangs out with The Cab for a while, because they're all good guys, and don't seem to mind him lurking about while they practice.
Then he goes to a diner and eats toast and jam for dinner. The waitress keeps asking if he's sure he doesn't want anything else.
He's not sure, but he keeps waving her off and saying it's fine.
-
Brendon's developing sort of a bad habit of calling people in the middle of the night. It's not like it's new territory or anything; Pete does the same thing to his band, apparently, so Brendon doesn't feel too bad about it, even though Pete Wentz is not the best of people to be compared to.
Anyway.
Spencer mumbles a "hyallo?" into the phone, and that's close enough to hi for Brendon's ears.
"I can't sleep," Brendon says.
"Pete?" Spencer says, and the first thing Brendon thinks is that he was right and that he's totally got a precedent he can cite if anyone asks him why he thought calling so late was a good idea.
"No. Come on. We don't sound a thing alike." Then, "Wait, does Pete call you a lot?"
"What? No? Brendon, it's like. Early. Late. It's not phone time."
"I have free evening and weekend minutes, Spencer. This is evening minutes."
"You have a free fucking phone," Spencer says, sounding exasperated. Brendon imagines Spencer rolling over onto his back and covering his eyes with one arm. He kind of wants to be there; sleepy Spencer is the best Spencer, especially for cuddling with.
Brendon says, "Speaking of phones. Don't I have my own ringtone? You can't mistake me for Pete, come on. That's not fair. You can't tell me you haven't given me my own ringtone."
"Shut up," Spencer says. "It's ... sometime. Go drink some warm milk or something."
"At least you didn't say go fuck yourself," Brendon says, thoughtfully. "You're better at this than Ryan." He pauses. "Hey! Hey, wait. So what's my ringtone?"
"What? Don't you still have ... fuck, I don't remember."
"No, no, when I call. Which I just did. You have to know. What's it set to?"
"Why does that -- I don't know." Spencer says, "Seriously. Try reading a book, maybe then you can sleep."
"I already did," Brendon says. "You should get that -- that ringtone of Ryan talking. And set it for me. Think about it."
"No. That would be even stupider than the current one."
"Which is?"
"I don't remember," Spencer says.
"Okay," Brendon says. "I surrender to your shaky memory. Do you remember my birthday? It's my birthday tomorrow."
"Oh, shit, it's -- no it's not. Fucker."
Brendon grins, smug. Not that Spencer can hear his facial expression or anything.
"Screw you," Spencer says with a loud yawn. "Sorry. Still sleeping."
"Sorry I woke you up," Brendon says. "Thanks for only being a little of a jerk."
"Welcome."
"You're better than Ryan," Brendon says. "You should get a prize. Second coolest member of the band, after me."
"Wow, that's flattering."
"Seriously."
"Okay," Spencer says. "Love you, good night."
"Wait, what --" Brendon says, but Spencer's already hung up. And doesn't answer the next five times in a row that Brendon tries to call.
-
"Spencer," Brendon says. "Spencer. Spencer."
"What?"
"Are you hungry?"
"Yeah," Spencer says, still staring blankly at the TV. There's a Flavor of Love 2 marathon on. They've been watching for three, three and a half hours now, probably. "What do you want to get? Do you think that Chinese place is still open?"
"I don't know." Brendon says, "You have anything in the fridge?"
"I don't know," Spencer says. "Maybe. I don't -- I ran out of frozen pizza. I might have some stuff you can eat."
"We should cook," Brendon says.
"I've probably got Pop Tarts," Spencer says.
"No, like. Not in a toaster. Let's cook, dude, I'm bored. I'm so. Seriously. I'm completely serious about this."
"I don't even know if I have anything."
"Have you gone shopping in the past month?"
"Yes."
"You at least have, like. Flour and eggs and stuff?"
"Yeah," Spencer says. "Yeah. Milk, too. And sugar."
"Any other shit?"
"I -- guess," Spencer says. "Dude, you seriously know how to cook?"
"I lived on my own for like a year, man, yeah. It's not like I could afford to eat out, oh, ever."
"Oh. That's sweet, dude, awesome." Spencer grins, and Brendon grins back, hopping up from the couch. Spencer says, "Oh, man, I'm going to have to get up, aren't I. Shit. And I was so attached to this, too. Look, Flava Flav's about to make an important life decision here."
"Are you making the important life decision to starve?"
"Yes."
"Come on, come on," Brendon says.
Spencer holds his arms out. Brendon laughs, shakes his head a little and hoists Spencer -- who's limp and not helping at all -- to his feet. Spencer slumps against Brendon. "I don't want to move."
"Dinner, dude. Home cooked dinner. It's gonna be the shit."
"Alright. Alright. I can motivate myself for home cooking," Spencer says seriously, straightening up.
Spencer has frozen vegetables, as it turns out, and olive oil, and Brendon is ecstatic. "Man, screw muffins. We're going to stir the hell out of this fry," Brendon declares.
"What?"
"It's stir fry time. Come on. Get with the program. Turn off. Tune in. Drop out."
Feeling like a broken record, Spencer says, "What?"
"Spencer," Brendon says. "I am so incredibly, absolutely, insanely bored. Words can't even. There's no qualifying my boredom, dude."
"Okay, here," Spencer says, and drops into a crouch so he can pull a frying pan out of the cabinet, handing it up to Brendon. Brendon sets it on the stove, then helps Spencer up even though Spencer really didn't need it from that position.
Spencer stands sort of awkwardly near the stove, because Brendon's the one doing the cooking. Brendon has to lean over across him to grab a knife, which he uses to cut open the bag of veggies. He's got oil heating on the stove already, and dumps the prepackaged stir fry into the pan.
"So," Brendon says. "That was exciting. What else should we make?" He looks up at Spencer. He's tapping one foot against the floor but is otherwise still and, if it wasn't for that motion, would almost seem sedate. "Oh, you got any parmesan?"
"Yeah?"
"Sweet," Brendon says, and he gives the thumbs up, bumps his hips against Spencer's before going to dig through the refrigerator. "Oh, you do have real vegetables!" he says, pulling some a relatively fresh onion and pepper out of the crisper drawer. "Keeping secrets from me?" He hums a little, teach you a lesson for keeping secrets from me.
Brendon starts chopping the lone, slightly sad looking red onion he found. It's not quite bad yet. He pushes down against the knife with the heel of his hand, pivoting it to make slow, narrow cuts. He's breathing steady, tongue sticking out of the corner of his mouth just a little as he concentrates.
There's a buzzing noise, and Spencer says, "Hello?"
"Huh?" Brendon tilts his head up a little, curious, then realizes it's just Spencer's phone. He grins at Spencer for a second before ducking his head down, letting out his breath in something that's not quite a laugh as he dices the thin slices of onion into tiny rectangles.
Spencer says, "Nah, we're just making dinner. What? Oh, no, me and Brendon. I'm mostly just watching, actually. What? Stir fry. He's -- is that an onion? He's cutting up onions or something, I don't know. Yeah, no, neither of us is dead yet, I'm pretty surprised." Spencer says, "What?"
He lowers his phone, covers the speaker with his palm. "Would you mind if Ryan comes over for dinner?"
"Oh," Brendon says. "I'm not sure if." He looks at how much food there's going to be (and actually stirs the almost-forgotten stuff in the frying pan)
. "I guess?"
"Right." Spencer puts the phone back to his ear, says, "Yeah, that's fine. See you soon."
Brendon scrapes the onion off the cutting board and in with the vegetables already there. He shoves the mixture around with a flat wooden spoon, not looking up.
Spencer wanders off, back into the living room, and Brendon can hear him changing channels. He leans on the counter, watching the food cook. His shoulders hurt, and he lets his eyes close for a minute, taking in a deep breath. The air is warm right in front of the stove. Brendon rolls his shoulders a few times before straightening up, digging through the cupboards for more seasonings to add.
He starts singing to himself, soft and low.
Ryan shows up, just walks in without knocking and says, "Hey, I brought Keltie, hope you guys don't mind."
Brendon's just taking the pan off the burner; he sets it down. He hugs both of them, says, "Hey, so I made dinner. There should be enough for everybody. You can serve yourselves or whatever; I'm just gonna go to the grocery store or something and buy Spence some more food or whatever."
"We'll save some for you," Ryan says.
Keltie says, "You should eat first, then go, so it doesn't get cold."
"Yeah, no," Brendon says. "I don't want to forget. It's cool. Later."
Spencer, he comes back into the room pointing at his plate with a fork, saying, "this is really good, dude," right as the door's shutting. "The fuck?"
"He said he's gonna go get some more groceries or something," Ryan says.
So Brendon's just turning the key in the ignition when Spencer slips into the passenger seat and pulls his seatbelt on. "I'm not letting you do my grocery shopping on your own," he says, simply.
"Oh," Brendon says. "Yeah. Good call. Man, let me do the shopping and you'd end up with, like. Real food and stuff, it'd be crazy."
"By real food, you mean lots of tater tots?"
"Tater tots are one of mankind's crowning achievements, shut up."
The rest of the drive is pretty quiet, and it's only as they're pulling into a parking space at the grocery store that Brendon says, "Wait, you seriously just left Ryan and Keltie at your place?"
"Yeah? They'll live without me."
"Dude," Brendon says.
"I do what I've gotta do," Spencer says. "And what I've got to do is protect my refrigerator from terrible decisions."
It's late, and the grocery store is all-but abandoned. There's oldies playing through tinny overhead speakers, not quite loud enough to drown out the buzz of the ancient yellowy lights.
"Yeah," Spencer says, examining a bruised apple. "I don't usually shop here, you know?"
"Yeah," Brendon says, and looks down at the depressing array of fruits and vegetables, then takes Spencer's wrist. Spencer shifts the apple to his other hand, sets it down, looks at Brendon. He's about to say something, has his eyebrows cocked up and his hips tilted just so, prepared to be clever should it become necessary. Brendon kisses him instead.
Spencer closes his eyes.
After a second, Brendon says, "We should probably. Uhm. Actually shop."
"Right," Spencer says, expression shutting down into forced neutral mode.
"And also make out in the car later."
Spencer laughs, so Brendon figures that's okay.
In frozen foods, Spencer grabs a bag of corn and tries to ignore how intently Brendon's studying the ice cream section. He wants to move on, but he doesn't really want to leave Brendon behind, so he keeps having to circle back. "Seriously, you don't need any sugar tonight."
"Every night is a good night for sugar," Brendon says.
Spencer says, "We're here to recover my losses. After you used all my food."
"It went to a good cause!"
"Feeding Ryan and Keltie," Spencer says.
"It was gonna be for you, dude."
"And you."
"Well, yes."
"They're not assholes, there'll be some left," Spencer says.
"But it'll be cold," Brendon says. "And I feel I need sugar and sweetness to make up for the ruination of my efforts."
"What the fuck?" Spencer says, with an incredulous laugh.
Brendon says, "Spencerrrrr." He shuffles his feet against the ground, placing himself soundly within Spencer's personal space. Spencer shifts his weight a little, raises his eyebrows as Brendon kisses his cheek. "Come on. I'll share. Sharing is caring."
Spencer snorts, and places a hand at the small of Brendon's back, pushing him forward just a little. "Whatever, dude, it's not like I'm going to pay for it. Get yourself some damn ice cream."
"You are the best, man," Brendon says.
-
When they get back, Ryan and Keltie are already gone, their dishes stacked clean next to the kitchen sink. Brendon says, "Hey, at least that was nice of them."
Spencer says, "Right, yeah, I hate when my best friend comes over to my place."
Brendon says, "It's only lame when I'm trying to seduce you."
"Is that what you were doing?" Spencer says.
"Well, yeah," Brendon says. "Mostly. That and I was really hungry." Brendon flops down on the couch, sprawling out. "Spence. Spence. Come cuddle."
"That works." Spencer sits down too, leaning up against Brendon. "So are we ever going to actually have dinner, or what?"
"I think make-outs come first, Spencer Smith." Brendon leans in to nip at Spencer's lower lip, grinning at him, eyes dark and narrow. They kiss close-mouthed for a little while, before Spencer shifts a little and Brendon parts his lips, at the same time letting out a sigh. He wriggles a little, making himself more comfortable. They fit nicely against each other, and Spencer is slow and responsive, one hand steady and solid on Brendon's upper arm. His beard, such as it is, is a little scratchy, but not unpleasantly so. Brendon says, "Pete was right."
"The fuck?" Spencer laughs, and takes the moment to move his arm to Brendon's side, tracing down his torso through the thin fabric of Brendon's shirt. "I've never made out with Pete, dude, so whatever he said --"
"No, no, dude, just that it's awesome being able to make out with your best friend." He continues quickly, "And I mean, I know I'm not your best friend, even though you're mine, but it's cool, I'm used to it."
"Yeah, well," Spencer says. "I don't want to make out with Ryan. So there." He kisses Brendon, a little more aggressive now that he's taking the initiative.
Eventually -- Brendon's not sure how much later it is -- Brendon says, "Hey, what time do you want to get up tomorrow?"
"I don't know," Spencer says. "Eventually. Is Jon getting back -- no, that's day after tomorrow. Alright, yeah, whenever."
"I'll wake you up if I get bored," Brendon says.
"Okay."
-
Brendon gets up early and makes coffee and toast with jam, which he leaves at the bedside in favor of straddling Spencer and kissing down his chest. He wraps a hand around the base of Spencer's cock, even though it's limp right now, and strokes it until its actually hard. Spencer cracks an eye open, making a soft sleepy little noise of confusion. Brendon shhes him, says, "Don't worry, I got it taken care of," with a little grin, and works his hand a little harder. He stops for a moment to spit in his palm again before quickening his strokes any.
Spencer, eyes still closed, groans and arches up a little into Brendon's hand.
-
Ryan's supposed to come over, only he gets -- stuck in traffic. Or something. Keltie shows up on her own anyway. Keltie says, "Way to bail the other day, guys."
"I needed groceries," Spencer says.
"He did," Brendon agrees. "Not as bad as I need to get Star Power, though, what the hell."
Keltie yawns, putting her arms behind her head. She's sitting on the couch, watching them play Guitar Hero. She's not particularly good at it, kind of prefers first person shooters on the occasions when she's talked into playing, so she's letting the two of them duke it out. Or play on cooperative, as it turns out.
Her phone buzzes, and she flips it open to read the text message. "Haha, Ryan saw a sale at Urban Outfitters. He's never going to show up." She says, "So, who're you guys getting to make the swans?"
"What -- the ice swans!" Brendon says.
Spencer says, "Dude, you're going to mess up. Pay attention."
"I've beat this song, like, a million times. Spencer. What are your thoughts on ice sculpture?"
"I don't know, I guess it's ... I don't know. I don't usually spend much time thinking about ice sculpture."
"Because we should have, like. Ice swans lining the aisle, dude, think about it."
Keltie says, "What, inside?"
Spencer says, "Do you guys know something I don't?"
"At the wedding, duh," Brendon says.
Keltie says, "You don't want the swans just melting on the floor."
"Right," Spencer says. "Because they're not going to melt in the fucking desert."
"We'd have it somewhere else, chill," Brendon says, then laughs. "Haha, chill. Somewhere cold. Where it's chilly."
"Right." Spencer says, "Somewhere cold. Like where?"
"Maine?" Brendon guesses. "They've got mountains up there, too; that's pretty awesome."
"Fucking Maine." Spencer laughs. "There's, like, moose in Maine."
"One of you could ride a moose down the aisle," Keltie says.
"I don't think the church would like it."
"We're not going to have any fucking moose at our wedding."
Keltie and Brendon both turn to stare at Spencer. "Dude, chill," Brendon says.
Spencer says, "I'm serious."
"That's what worries me," Keltie says with a laugh.
"Shut up."
"Come on, moose are pretty cool." Keltie says, "They're probably a little big for an indoor wedding, though, it's true."
"Can you train them?" Brendon says. "I want to train a moose. Have it as my pet."
"Live like a rockstar," Keltie says. "It's a lifestyle choice, owning a moose."
"Some people are cat people," Brendon says, waving a hand. "And some people are moose people. That's just the way of things. I don't know if this's gonna work out if you can't handle that."
Spencer says, "Is owning moose even legal?"
"I don't know," Brendon says.
"Keep it in your bathtub."
"That's alligators," Spencer says.
"We could get an alligator," Brendon says. "But I don't think you could ride it at our wedding."
"Maybe a tortoise," Keltie says.
"I don't want to die before the ceremony's over," Spencer says.
Eventually, Ryan calls again, and Keltie ends up leaving -- "It's been fun, guys, but I'm going to go -- well, you know, I'd tell you, but you're both single these days, right? So it'd be pretty unfair. We're going to go have a wholesome time playing Scrabble. Tournament rules."
"I hope you get all the triple word scores," Brendon tells her solemnly.
-
Brendon says, "So I was looking at, like, ice sculptors? And I don't know, I was emailing this dude."
"About ice sculptures," Spencer says.
"Yeah. Like, just, when he'd be up for doing that, you know. I figure cost doesn't matter too much; the album's doing good."
Spencer rolls his eyes, but -- if it was anyone else, he'd probably be freaking out, but it's been a year of holding hands and stealing moments to make out backstage at venues and sex when they have time for it, a year of Brendon and his stupid, what if we got tigers, Spencer? Like Siegfried and Roy! and Spencer talking him down to just hiring the Lucent Dossier dance troupe again. It only takes them a month and a half to tell everyone they're together -- everyone meaning the rest of the band and Pete, because Pete's good with the media and all. Ryan mostly just rolls his eyes at them and asks when they plan to stop being so sickeningly cute. They tell everyone, but never actually talk about it other than that.
Brendon butts his head against Spencer's chest, curled up next to him on his side, and says, "So I could show you pictures or something."
"Yeah, sure," Spencer says, stroking his thumb along the inside of Brendon's elbow. "Later, though. Right now, I don't wanna move. Fuck." He rolls onto his side, closing his eyes tight. "I'm glad that tour's over. Just. Fuck."
"Fuck," Brendon says agreeably. "We did good, though. You're my favorite member of Panic! at the Disco, Spence. Can I get your autograph? Like, omagawd."
Spencer says, "Oh, no, it's coming from inside the house."
"Haha, what?"
"The danger," Spencer says.
"Yes. I am going to assault you. Maybe put roofies in your food. You know."
"Would a lock of my hair pacify you? You could sell it on eBay or something when you grow out of your phase."
Brendon says, "Hey, you're not a phase. You're totally not a phase. You don't think you're a phase, right?"
"Uh," Spencer says.
"I mean, not that," Brendon says. "I mean."
"No," Spencer says. He sits up a little, leans over so he can press his forehead against Brendon's. The position is sort of awkward, and he's going a little cross-eyed trying to look at Brendon, but before he moves, he says, "Not a phase. It's okay."
"Right." Brendon says, "Okay, good."
-
Spencer's not one for nervous tics, but he's managed to chew his lower lip raw to the point where it's bleeding a little. Ryan's telling him about ... something. Spencer honestly has no idea what, except that it involves Dan Angel, Keltie, and a group of thirteen year olds who wanted their chests signed.
Spencer says, "So hey, anyway. Reason I stopped by."
"Oh, right," Ryan says.
"So I'm not asking for your opinion on this or anything; I'm just letting you know because you're my best friend, and you deserve to know."
"Go ahead and get the operation if it'll save your life," Ryan says solemnly.
"Yeah, Ryan, that is exactly what I was talking about. Surgery." He says, "No. Close. I'm going to ask Brendon something, like, I guess if he wants to marry me. Just warning you. Thanks. Bye."
Ryan says, "Wait, seriously?"
"Yeah." Spencer says, "See you later; I'm going to dinner pretty much right now."
-
Spencer says, "I'm thinking Vermont."
"That's pretty close to Maine, dude," Brendon says. "There's moose there too."
"Yeah, I know, but I figure they're an unavoidable danger if we want a northern winter wedding."
"It's an acceptable risk." Brendon narrows his eyes, nodding seriously. Then Brendon says, "So uhm."
Spencer makes a noncommital noise, and uses his chopsticks to pick up a piece of chicken. The waiter comes by, fills up their water glasses again, and disappears before Brendon can finish saying thanks.
Brendon ducks his head and goes back to his meal, poking at it ineffectively with his fork and knife, taking tiny bites and chewing very slowly.
"What's up?" Spencer finally asks. He drops one hand to his pocket, to make sure the little cardboard box is still there. He paid a friend to make a box, because he figured that'd be cooler than the box the jewelry store wanted him to use.
It takes Brendon a while to actually answer; he finishes chewing before saying anything. Spencer's not used to that, so he starts talking at the same time as Brendon.
"Because I was thinking maybe --"
"Like, shut me up if this is awkward or anything, but like, I kind of --"
Spencer says, "You go."
"Uhm," Brendon says. "You're not. Like. I know how it started out and all, and like, how we started out, but, uhm. I think maybe we should. Ditch the stupid marriage joke, I don't know."
"Oh," Spencer says. "Yeah. Yeah, right."
"Okay," Brendon says.
"Yeah, it's probably a good call." Spencer nods, and shoves his food around a little on his plate. He reaches out to take another dumpling from one of the communal dishes in the middle of the table. "Right."
"It's just," Brendon starts.
"Yeah, no, it's cool," Spencer says. "It's fine."
-
Keltie says, "Oh, oh, so Ryan here got me on the guestlist for Arctic Monkeys tomorrow? It's going to be so, so cool. Seriously." She laughs, nuzzling her face against Ryan's shoulder, then looks up, grins. "I'm not gonna have to make him get me on you guys's guest list, right?"
Spencer snorts, but doesn't say anything.
Brendon says, "Well, yeah, only it's not like we're actually getting married or anything. It was just some dumb joke or something, I guess."
"Yeah. It's getting pretty old," Spencer says. "So shut the fuck up. It wasn't even that funny."
"Spence, dude, chill out. Don't be a jerk to my girlfriend."
"No, dude," Spencer says. "I'm not going to be nice just because she's your girlfriend."
"The hell," Ryan says.
Keltie says, "Look, wow, you didn't have to freak out or anything."
"I'm not freaking out," Spencer says. "I'm just apparently the only one who knows when tired shit has been taken way too fucking far."
Brendon says, "Dude. Come on. The fuck?"
Spencer parrots him, voice mocking -- "Dude. Come on."
"Wow, uhm," Keltie says.
Ryan says, "So."
Keltie says, "How about the weather?"
"Sure is a nice day," Ryan says.
"Yup," Keltie says. "Perfect temperature."
"Definitely."
Spencer says, "I'm kind of tired; I'm going to skip the movie."
"Do you need a ride?" Brendon says.
"I can get a cab."
"Uhm," Brendon says. "Okay. Okay, uh, bye."
-
Brendon says, "Jon. I need advice."
"Yeah?" Jon says, "My advice is, don't leave the oven on if you're going on tour."
"Wow, what? What -- fuck, dude, did -- is your house okay?" Brendon says, "Fuck! Why didn't I hear about this?"
"No, nothing happened, I'm just giving you advice."
"Wow, thanks, Jon. Thanks."
"You're welcome."
"Seriously, though. Like. How did you get Cassie to think you weren't kidding when you asked her to marry you?"
"What? Why would she even --"
"Hypothetically."
"How did I hypothetically do something I actually did?"
"Yes."
Jon says, "I don't know that I can help you, little man."
Brendon says, "Jon Walker, you are hereby demoted. Way to be least coolest member of Panic! at the Disco."
"At least I'm cooler than Brent."
"I don't know ..." Brendon says, trailing off.
"Harsh."
"Like a Brillo pad to a shark."
"Uh, yeah, that," Jon says. "Hey, hold up a minute, Cassie's -- what? No, what is it? Just tell me, it's cool -- wait, what? Seriously? Brendon. I'm going to hang up on you now, okay?"
"Okay."
"Thanks," Jon says, and hangs up.
-
Jon says, "Spencer, you'd better not be asking for vague advice without explaining the situation."
"No. Can I come over for a bit?"
"Uh, sure, I guess; me and Cassie were about to watch a movie or something."
"If it's a bad time --"
"No, it's cool."
-
Nothing interesting happens at Jon's Vegas apartment, unless Spencer seeing 40 Year Old Virgin for the sixteenth time is interesting.
-
They play a little local show with The Cab that week -- tickets have been sold out since a month ago, when they decided to do it in the first place. It's a tiny venue, and with how many tickets were snapped up by scalpers then posted on Craigslist at over-high prices, the venue isn't as full as it could be. They even intentionally undersold, making sure the place wouldn't be at capacity, just because they wanted things a little more relaxed.
So Brendon goes out and sings with The Cab on one song, and one of the guys from The Cab comes on during Nine in the Afternoon to sing a verse, and -- really, it's mostly The Cab bringing the positive energy to the stage, even during Panic! at the Disco's actual set. Brendon's a little subdued, and Jon's just sort of confused, leaving it up to Ryan to try to carry the weight of the performance pretty much on his own.
It's an average show -- not great, not terrible, just acceptable -- but the crowd still screams for them to come back after they've left the stage, and Ryan says, "Fuck, I'm tired."
"Yeah, me too." Spencer stretches his arms out and cracks his knuckles.
"We could just do it acoustic," Jon says. "An acoustic encore. Spencer, all you'd have to do is play cowbell or something."
"I've got a fever --" Brendon starts.
"The only cure is more time at the disco," Jon says. "You have to dance 'till you can sweat it out."
"But I can't!" Brendon says.
Ryan just shakes his head and says, "You guys are pretty odd."
Brendon stares at him for a second before laughing, hard.
Spencer says, "Whatever, I guess we can do it; they still haven't shut up."
So they go back out, and the crowd goes wild, and Spencer feels appreciated, maybe. They've only discussed the first two songs they're playing for the encore, but one of the venue staff, when he looks over, gives them the thumbs up for more time, and Brendon's just stalling for time talking to the audience. Then he and Ryan and Jon huddle for a bit, while Spencer sits at his drum kit twirling his sticks. He idly tosses one out to the crowd, grabbing another one after he does. He takes a long drink from the water bottle sitting on the floor next to him.
Spencer can't even really kill time talking to the audience, because he doesn't have a mic on him. He's never been into talking to the crowd, even though he sometimes ends up carrying entire interviews, but the crowd's getting a little impatient and shouting shit out.
Finally Brendon wanders back, says, "We're gonna do that cover of 'July, July!', dude, that okay?"
Spencer nods, says, "Yeah, sure, so you wanna get married for real?"
"Yeah, sounds good," Brendon says. Then, "Wait, what?"
Spencer taps a stick against the metal edge of one of his drums, counting off the rhythm, and says, "Come on, crowd's waiting."
Brendon spends the song bouncing around the stage like a kangaroo on crack-cocaine, going back and forth between Ryan and Jon and constantly turning to grin at Spencer. He actually manages to keep his voice from going all over the place, too; the sound's good tonight and he can hear himself properly on the monitor, which is helping. Right before the song's over, he goes over to pause between verse and final chorus to kiss Ryan on the cheek, then gives Jon the same treatment.
He finishes singing, though, July, July, July, it never seemed so, never seemed so strange -- then, as the instrumentation drops out, and Ryan's still picking the last few notes on his guitar, Brendon announces into his microphone, "Okay, so actually the strangest thing is the part where I'm getting married. In case you all were wondering."
He doesn't kiss Spencer on the cheek before they get offstage, but he does kiss him.
brendon/spencer, with some ryan/keltie and background jon/cassie. r. 8132 words.
thanks to wishpaper and chopsticknoodle for looking this over, and dreamofthem for grooming this thing into consistency. Title from a Good Clean Fun song; cut text from a Decemberists song.
Brendon says, "Spencer, Spencer, you'll spare my life, right?"
"Yeah, of course," Spencer says. "We're a team. A team Ryan's not a member of."
"There's only three of us, come on," Ryan says, just as the match starts. "That's not cool."
Brendon says, "Maybe if you weren't the undisputed champion or something, we might go easy on you."
Ryan says, "You're just jealous."
"Maybe you're just jealous because you're going to lose for once," Spencer says. "Keltie isn't here to save you now." (Ryan refuses to admit it, but Keltie's even better at Halo than he is.)
Brendon beams, singing, "You're just jealous 'coz we're young and in love."
They're playing Halo 3, and Ryan says, "God damn, why don't you guys just go get married already."
Brendon grins, jabbing Spencer in the side with his elbow. "Hey there, Spencer Smith, what do you say? I think it's a pretty good suggestion."
With a shrug, Spencer says, "Yeah, sure. Why not?"
Brendon says, "What?"
Ryan covers his face in his hands. The announcer in the game says, headshot! Then, double kill!
Brendon says, "Son of a motherfucker."
Spencer looks smug.
The announcer shouts, killing spree!
-
Ryan calls Keltie, and she comes over and wipes the floor with the rest of them.
-
Ryan says, "I think we should start on the new album."
"Without Jon?" Brendon says.
"Oh. Right." Ryan says, "So what else do you guys want to do?"
Spencer says, "I'm not getting high with you guys again."
"What the fuck? I wasn't going to suggest it, shut up." Ryan's laying across the couch, head on Spencer's lap and not a pillow because Spencer's a jerk who refuses to move.
"I know you, dude," Spencer says, bouncing his leg. "You were."
Ryan scowls for a moment, before reaching up to punch Spencer in the shoulder. "Like you have any better ideas."
Brendon says, "We could go to a bakery, see how much Spencer and mine's cake's gonna cost."
"Spencer and mine's?" Ryan repeats, incredulously. Then, "What cake?"
"Our wedding cake, duh," Brendon says.
Spencer raises his eyebrows. With a barely-restrained smile, he asks, "We're getting married?"
"You agreed, Spencer, don't turn your back on me now."
Spencer drums his hands against his thigh, then tilts his head a little to the side. He looks from Ryan to Brendon, then says, "Did you know Wal-Mart makes wedding cakes?"
"Sweet." Brendon says, "We're going to have the classiest wedding ever, Spencer."
Ryan says, "I haven't gotten my invitation yet." He says, "Brendon, did you even bother to ask Spence's parents for, you know, your future wife's hand in marriage?"
"Wait, why am I the bride?" Spencer says. "I'm not bride material. I have a beard." He rubs at his neck, lifting his head up to better display the fuzz there.
"That's not a beard. That's just ugly."
"Hey," Spencer says. "It's better than you can do."
"Shut up."
-
Brendon and Ryan and Keltie and Spencer have a four o'clock flight to Chicago. Ryan spends the hour's wait at the airport trying to argue the gate attendant into switching seats around to let him and Keltie sit together. Keltie just laughs and shakes her head, sitting in the airport chairs with Brendon and Spencer.
"He booked our tickets really late," she says. "As in, last night-late."
"I give him forty five more second before he pulls out 'but I'm famous' as a reason to get to sit next to you," Brendon says.
Ryan manages to get a seat right in front of Keltie's, which puts him soundly in front of business class. He spends most of the flight talking about how comfortable he is, and how much more comfortable he'd be if his girlfriend had gotten the seat next to him.
Brendon bought tickets for himself and Spencer over a month ago.
-
Ryan and Keltie have a whole suite, but Brendon and Spencer just have a cramped little room with two twin beds. They could have afforded separate rooms, but why bother, it's not like they need much space. They're not staying long.
Brendon tosses his bag onto the bed nearest the door, digs through it for his pajamas -- he has two days' worth of clothes, one for tomorrow and one for the plane ride the day after, and he brought pajamas. They're cotton and covered in sheep.
Spencer says, "Seriously?"
"I like to live in comfort and style, what can I say."
-
"Today is the day, Spencer Smith. Rise and shine. It is time to face destiny!"
"It's not our destiny, christ, shut up, what time is it," Spencer mumbles, not really asking a question.
"Time to get up," Brendon says. He's already in his suit, hair a little damp from his shower. Spencer gets up to take a shower, but. First he adjusts Brendon's collar, because part of it is turned inside out. Brendon cocks his head to the side, questioning, and Spencer just shrugs and goes to get himself ready.
After Spencer's out of the shower and dressed, while he's doing his hair, Brendon sits on the bathroom counter and kicks his feet, singing old 504 Plan songs.
Spencer says, "Shouldn't you be doing something else? I'll be ready in a minute."
"Like what?" Brendon says, but he slides off the counter, puts his hands in his pockets.
"Are you seriously done getting ready?"
"I got up early," Brendon says. "Couldn't sleep."
"It's not like it's your wedding."
Brendon shrugs. "I'll go watch TV."
"Right."
Brendon looks down, then back up, expression shifting like he's steeling himself for something, but all he does is take a step forward, and readjusts Spencer's tie. He tugs it a little tighter, straightening it, smoothing it flat. "There," he says, and disappears back into the main room. He turns the volume up high, watching cartoons.
It takes Spencer more than a minute before he finishes up on his hair.
-
"Spencer, Spencer," Brendon whispers.
Spencer raises a finger to his lips, shakes his head just the slightest bit. Brendon slumps down in the pew, then remembers himself and sits up tall to peer around the giant hairdo of the woman in front of him, some Midwestern relative of Jon's. Maybe a great-grandmother. She's old and reminds Brendon a little of his own relatives, in that she smells like flowers and laundry detergent and whatever it is that makes old people smell old.
His feet are bouncing.
Spencer kicks his ankle, and Brendon looks at him. Spencer just rolls his eyes.
Brendon really likes weddings. He can't help being enthusiastic. They just. Make him more energetic.
The whole wedding, Tom's been hiding behind his camera. He's allowed, though, since he's the official photographer. Word is, Jon's even paying him. Jon knows how much film development can cost, and apparently there was a whole conversation about whether Tom'd shoot digital or analog. Analog won out. Tom even has a light meter with him, and is metering and adjusting for half the shots he takes.
Brendon maybe reaches for Spencer's hand when Jon and Cassie take their vows. Just maybe.
Spencer maybe squeezes Brendon's hand back. They don't look at each other.
Brendon says, "My dinner is better than yours."
Spencer says, "What? What even is that?"
"It's better. And that wasn't a sentence, Spencer Smith," Brendon says. "Away to the grammar gulag with you."
"It was a sentence. There was a subject, an action, and a verb."
"It was a malformed question," Brendon says. He says, "Anyway, we're gonna have vegetarian entrees at our wedding, Spencer. Our wedding is going to kick this wedding's ass."
Ryan says, "Guys, shut up," because Jon's dad has just stood up to make a speech.
Brendon drinks a lot of champagne.
He whispers, "Let's go, let's go, let's go," to Spencer, when the dancing starts, and Spencer is probably a little tipsy also, says, "But Brendon, I'm not wearing my dancing shoes," and they go dance anyway.
Pete steals Travis' spot as DJ to announce that it is totally time for married couples to get their motherfucking groove on, okay, so I'm going to turn this shit back over to Travis, actually, because me and Patrick are going to tear shit up on that dance floor, seriously and there's a lot of tittering from Cassie's half of the wedding party.
So Spencer starts to leave, but Brendon says, "Spencer! Spencer Smith. We will keep dancing. All night. This is my solemn vow, to carry on dancing. Don't leave me dancing by myself, Spencer Smith," and Spencer doesn't leave, by some miracle.
So.
Brendon may or may not lean on Spencer. "It is time to slowdance, Spencer Smith," he says.
He definitely presses his face into Spencer's shoulder. Spencer's hair is a little long again, sort of scratches against Brendon's face. It smells clean, with the slightest hint of honey, maybe. Sweetness and warmth is what it boils down to. Maybe Brendon's projecting.
He says, "I want to be married, Spencer Smith."
"No you don't. You want to be in our band."
"Jon Walker isn't leaving the band."
"No," Spencer says. "That's because our band kicks ass."
Brendon says, "I won't leave." He's talking as low as he can. The music isn't up too high, thankfully. "I wouldn't."
Spencer walks off. Brendon lets him go, doesn't quite follow as he wanders off the dance floor.
Brendon leaves late, and Spencer is already asleep when he gets back to their hotel room, curled up on his bed, on top of the covers.
Brendon lays on his own bed for a while and stares up at the ceiling.
In the morning, he wakes up curled around Spencer and doesn't remember when he moved to get there.
Spencer doesn't really smell like anything except maybe sweat, a little. Brendon kisses the back of his neck, just -- because. He doesn't think about it.
He falls back asleep.
When he wakes up again, Spencer is in the shower. Neither of them says anything.
Later that day, Brendon says, "Spencer, do you ever want to get married?"
"I don't know," Spencer says. "I guess. Maybe."
Brendon says, "That's good."
Spencer's head hurts, and the noise from the traffic isn't helping. He watches the passing cars. "I guess."
Brendon says, "Our wedding would kick ass. If we had one."
Spencer snorts, says, "Hey, we've got the walk sign, come on."
On the plane, while it's taking off, flying them back to Vegas, Brendon reaches for Spencer's hand again, leans his head against Spencer's shoulder. He says, "Spencer Smith."
Spencer's eyes are closed, and Brendon's not sure if he's asleep yet or not. He kisses Spencer on the cheek. Later, when he drops his head to Spencer's shoulder again, Spencer's head lolls sideways so it's resting against Brendon's.
Brendon manages to pretend he doesn't notice hard enough that he falls asleep, too, and doesn't wake up again until the plane touches land in Vegas.
-
Brendon spends three days catching up with old friends before getting bored again, and calling Spencer.
"Hey, Bren," Spencer says. "I was about to call you, but Ryan just called."
"We're losers," Brendon says.
"Codependent ones, apparently," Spencer says. "So what's up?"
"I'm bored. Come watch Disney movies with me, Spencer," Brendon says. "We can get Chinese and watch movies, and it'll be awesome."
"Alright. We gotta get something for Ryan, too; don't want him feeling all left out."
"Right, right," Brendon says.
-
Ryan says he'll be there in half an hour, so Spencer and Brendon sit around and wait for him. Brendon says, "We could get Chinese."
"We just did, dude, the fuck?"
"No. For the wedding, duh," Brendon says.
"Dude, Chinese food at a wedding reception?"
"It's delicious," Brendon says.
"We're not getting it from this place, anyway," Spencer says.
"Of course not, no, this place sucks. We'll get. Like. Gourmet Chinese. It'll be the shit." He says, "Besides, we're celebrities, we're allowed to be all nontraditional."
"Right, right," Spencer says. "Man, we can get fucking -- General Tso's chicken. Best food dish ever."
"No, come on, half our friends are vegetarian. And I cannot condone serving dead animals at the reception, Spencer Smith, that's just cruel and unusual."
"But it's so fucking good."
"No, seriously. No General Tso's. Unless it's, like, General Tso's tofu."
"Do they do that?"
"I don't know. They should, though."
"We can force them to," Spencer says.
The door opens -- Brendon left it unlocked, because it's easier than having to get up and open it in the middle of dinner. Ryan says, "Hey, what's up?"
Spencer says, "Do they make, like, General Tso's chicken, only with tofu?"
"What? I don't know," Ryan says. "Why?"
"We're trying to figure out if we can get it at the reception," Brendon says.
"Are you guys seriously still talking about that?"
Brendon and Spencer both shrug and look back down at their food, and pick up their forks to eat in unison.
"Seriously, let it rest. It's getting kind of old."
"Our love will never get old, Ryan Ross."
Ryan rolls his eyes. "So what'd you guys get me?"
-
The third night in a row that Spencer sleeps over at Brendon's, Brendon says, "You might as well just move in, you're here so much."
"Oh, sorry," Spencer says. "I'll get my stuff together in a minute."
"What?"
"I'll just, you know, get my stuff together and head home, you know? I've been staying here too much, you're right."
"I never said that," Brendon says. "I said you might as well just move in."
"Oh," Spencer says. "But you won't have a guest room anymore."
"That's why man invented the sofa bed."
-
"Good morning, Ryan Ross," Brendon sings into the phone. "I need help."
"No. It's three AM. Is this an emergency?"
"It is! Ryan, Ryan, what color tuxedo should I get?"
"Black," Ryan says. "Now shut up and let me sleep."
-
He says, "Black? You're sure?"
"What the fuck -- it's five in the -- fuck you. No, Keltie, everything's fine, go back to sleep."
"Do you think we can get orchids this time of year?"
"What -- I'm hanging up now."
Brendon scowls and calls Pete. Pete is a lot more enthusiastic.
-
When Ryan comes over, which he inevitably does, he says, "Why did NME call me at nine in the morning?"
"What?"
"Why are British music journalists calling me about you and Spencer getting married at nine o'clock in the morning?" Ryan says. "The only people allowed to wake me up at nine in the morning are Spencer, if there's something important, or Keltie, if she's going down on me. Otherwise, no. So what the fuck."
"Oh," Brendon says. "Uhm. What are we talking about?"
"Your pretend wedding. Have you been telling people, or what? Seriously, it was funny at first, but like. What?"
"I might have called Pete," Brendon says.
"Pete's smart about press. Pete wouldn't leak that shit."
"And, uhm. And maybe Gabe." Gabe was even more enthused than Pete, when Brendon called.
"Christ."
-
So there's a stupid little blurb in NME the next week, about how Panic!'s still on hiatus but finding ways to occupy their time with their bassist off in foreign lands.
-
Jon and Cassie get back from Santorini, only 'get back' means they're in Chicago, and the band's still on this temporary hiatus, and Brendon's getting antsy. Brendon's writing songs on his own, recording them track by track and mixing them on his computer and sending them to Patrick via e-mail.
He writes, pstump make it better ok.
Apparently, that's reason enough for Ryan to call and say, "Hey, Brendon, what's up?"
"Nothing," Brendon says. "I went grocery shopping!"
"Are you okay?"
"Why would -- what?" Brendon says. "Yes?"
"Pete said Patrick told him you're being emo."
"I wrote some music," Brendon says. "And sent it to Patrick for advice."
"Oh," Ryan says. He shouts, "Pete, stop being a dumbass! Tell Patrick to do the same!"
There's a lot of noise on the other end of the line, all of a sudden. Lots of thudding. Brendon's pretty sure he hears Pete shouting something about how, "I'm the only person allowed to call Patrick a dumbass, Ross!"
"Don't die, Ryan," Brendon says before hanging up. He's pretty sure Ryan doesn't hear him.
-
Brendon says, "Keltie, Keltie, when should our wedding be?"
"Have you been drinking?"
"No," Brendon says.
"Are you high?"
"Maybe a little," Brendon says, huffing into his phone's speaker. "C'mon. When should we get married? I kind of want a winter wedding. With snow. In the north. The north, Keltie."
"We're not getting married, Brendon," Keltie says, her tone light. "Go to bed."
"No, not our wedding," Brendon whines. "Me and Spencer. When we get married. I want swans made out of ice, Keltie, do you think Spencer would like swans made out of ice?"
"I don't know. Hold on." The sound goes tinny and muffled as Keltie shouts, "Hey, Ryan, does Spencer like ice sculpture?" Then her voice is clear again. She coughs. "You could talk him into it, I bet."
"Oh, good," Brendon says. "Because I want ice swans."
"Brendon, sweetie," Keltie says. "Go to bed."
"Okay. Okay. I'm going to put a record on first. A good one."
"Okay, Brendon. Good night."
"Good night, Keltie. Go have a fulfilling evening with Ryan Ross."
"Okay. Good night."
"And use --"
Keltie hangs up.
-
Brendon is starting to hate having time off. He hangs out with The Cab for a while, because they're all good guys, and don't seem to mind him lurking about while they practice.
Then he goes to a diner and eats toast and jam for dinner. The waitress keeps asking if he's sure he doesn't want anything else.
He's not sure, but he keeps waving her off and saying it's fine.
-
Brendon's developing sort of a bad habit of calling people in the middle of the night. It's not like it's new territory or anything; Pete does the same thing to his band, apparently, so Brendon doesn't feel too bad about it, even though Pete Wentz is not the best of people to be compared to.
Anyway.
Spencer mumbles a "hyallo?" into the phone, and that's close enough to hi for Brendon's ears.
"I can't sleep," Brendon says.
"Pete?" Spencer says, and the first thing Brendon thinks is that he was right and that he's totally got a precedent he can cite if anyone asks him why he thought calling so late was a good idea.
"No. Come on. We don't sound a thing alike." Then, "Wait, does Pete call you a lot?"
"What? No? Brendon, it's like. Early. Late. It's not phone time."
"I have free evening and weekend minutes, Spencer. This is evening minutes."
"You have a free fucking phone," Spencer says, sounding exasperated. Brendon imagines Spencer rolling over onto his back and covering his eyes with one arm. He kind of wants to be there; sleepy Spencer is the best Spencer, especially for cuddling with.
Brendon says, "Speaking of phones. Don't I have my own ringtone? You can't mistake me for Pete, come on. That's not fair. You can't tell me you haven't given me my own ringtone."
"Shut up," Spencer says. "It's ... sometime. Go drink some warm milk or something."
"At least you didn't say go fuck yourself," Brendon says, thoughtfully. "You're better at this than Ryan." He pauses. "Hey! Hey, wait. So what's my ringtone?"
"What? Don't you still have ... fuck, I don't remember."
"No, no, when I call. Which I just did. You have to know. What's it set to?"
"Why does that -- I don't know." Spencer says, "Seriously. Try reading a book, maybe then you can sleep."
"I already did," Brendon says. "You should get that -- that ringtone of Ryan talking. And set it for me. Think about it."
"No. That would be even stupider than the current one."
"Which is?"
"I don't remember," Spencer says.
"Okay," Brendon says. "I surrender to your shaky memory. Do you remember my birthday? It's my birthday tomorrow."
"Oh, shit, it's -- no it's not. Fucker."
Brendon grins, smug. Not that Spencer can hear his facial expression or anything.
"Screw you," Spencer says with a loud yawn. "Sorry. Still sleeping."
"Sorry I woke you up," Brendon says. "Thanks for only being a little of a jerk."
"Welcome."
"You're better than Ryan," Brendon says. "You should get a prize. Second coolest member of the band, after me."
"Wow, that's flattering."
"Seriously."
"Okay," Spencer says. "Love you, good night."
"Wait, what --" Brendon says, but Spencer's already hung up. And doesn't answer the next five times in a row that Brendon tries to call.
-
"Spencer," Brendon says. "Spencer. Spencer."
"What?"
"Are you hungry?"
"Yeah," Spencer says, still staring blankly at the TV. There's a Flavor of Love 2 marathon on. They've been watching for three, three and a half hours now, probably. "What do you want to get? Do you think that Chinese place is still open?"
"I don't know." Brendon says, "You have anything in the fridge?"
"I don't know," Spencer says. "Maybe. I don't -- I ran out of frozen pizza. I might have some stuff you can eat."
"We should cook," Brendon says.
"I've probably got Pop Tarts," Spencer says.
"No, like. Not in a toaster. Let's cook, dude, I'm bored. I'm so. Seriously. I'm completely serious about this."
"I don't even know if I have anything."
"Have you gone shopping in the past month?"
"Yes."
"You at least have, like. Flour and eggs and stuff?"
"Yeah," Spencer says. "Yeah. Milk, too. And sugar."
"Any other shit?"
"I -- guess," Spencer says. "Dude, you seriously know how to cook?"
"I lived on my own for like a year, man, yeah. It's not like I could afford to eat out, oh, ever."
"Oh. That's sweet, dude, awesome." Spencer grins, and Brendon grins back, hopping up from the couch. Spencer says, "Oh, man, I'm going to have to get up, aren't I. Shit. And I was so attached to this, too. Look, Flava Flav's about to make an important life decision here."
"Are you making the important life decision to starve?"
"Yes."
"Come on, come on," Brendon says.
Spencer holds his arms out. Brendon laughs, shakes his head a little and hoists Spencer -- who's limp and not helping at all -- to his feet. Spencer slumps against Brendon. "I don't want to move."
"Dinner, dude. Home cooked dinner. It's gonna be the shit."
"Alright. Alright. I can motivate myself for home cooking," Spencer says seriously, straightening up.
Spencer has frozen vegetables, as it turns out, and olive oil, and Brendon is ecstatic. "Man, screw muffins. We're going to stir the hell out of this fry," Brendon declares.
"What?"
"It's stir fry time. Come on. Get with the program. Turn off. Tune in. Drop out."
Feeling like a broken record, Spencer says, "What?"
"Spencer," Brendon says. "I am so incredibly, absolutely, insanely bored. Words can't even. There's no qualifying my boredom, dude."
"Okay, here," Spencer says, and drops into a crouch so he can pull a frying pan out of the cabinet, handing it up to Brendon. Brendon sets it on the stove, then helps Spencer up even though Spencer really didn't need it from that position.
Spencer stands sort of awkwardly near the stove, because Brendon's the one doing the cooking. Brendon has to lean over across him to grab a knife, which he uses to cut open the bag of veggies. He's got oil heating on the stove already, and dumps the prepackaged stir fry into the pan.
"So," Brendon says. "That was exciting. What else should we make?" He looks up at Spencer. He's tapping one foot against the floor but is otherwise still and, if it wasn't for that motion, would almost seem sedate. "Oh, you got any parmesan?"
"Yeah?"
"Sweet," Brendon says, and he gives the thumbs up, bumps his hips against Spencer's before going to dig through the refrigerator. "Oh, you do have real vegetables!" he says, pulling some a relatively fresh onion and pepper out of the crisper drawer. "Keeping secrets from me?" He hums a little, teach you a lesson for keeping secrets from me.
Brendon starts chopping the lone, slightly sad looking red onion he found. It's not quite bad yet. He pushes down against the knife with the heel of his hand, pivoting it to make slow, narrow cuts. He's breathing steady, tongue sticking out of the corner of his mouth just a little as he concentrates.
There's a buzzing noise, and Spencer says, "Hello?"
"Huh?" Brendon tilts his head up a little, curious, then realizes it's just Spencer's phone. He grins at Spencer for a second before ducking his head down, letting out his breath in something that's not quite a laugh as he dices the thin slices of onion into tiny rectangles.
Spencer says, "Nah, we're just making dinner. What? Oh, no, me and Brendon. I'm mostly just watching, actually. What? Stir fry. He's -- is that an onion? He's cutting up onions or something, I don't know. Yeah, no, neither of us is dead yet, I'm pretty surprised." Spencer says, "What?"
He lowers his phone, covers the speaker with his palm. "Would you mind if Ryan comes over for dinner?"
"Oh," Brendon says. "I'm not sure if." He looks at how much food there's going to be (and actually stirs the almost-forgotten stuff in the frying pan)
. "I guess?"
"Right." Spencer puts the phone back to his ear, says, "Yeah, that's fine. See you soon."
Brendon scrapes the onion off the cutting board and in with the vegetables already there. He shoves the mixture around with a flat wooden spoon, not looking up.
Spencer wanders off, back into the living room, and Brendon can hear him changing channels. He leans on the counter, watching the food cook. His shoulders hurt, and he lets his eyes close for a minute, taking in a deep breath. The air is warm right in front of the stove. Brendon rolls his shoulders a few times before straightening up, digging through the cupboards for more seasonings to add.
He starts singing to himself, soft and low.
Ryan shows up, just walks in without knocking and says, "Hey, I brought Keltie, hope you guys don't mind."
Brendon's just taking the pan off the burner; he sets it down. He hugs both of them, says, "Hey, so I made dinner. There should be enough for everybody. You can serve yourselves or whatever; I'm just gonna go to the grocery store or something and buy Spence some more food or whatever."
"We'll save some for you," Ryan says.
Keltie says, "You should eat first, then go, so it doesn't get cold."
"Yeah, no," Brendon says. "I don't want to forget. It's cool. Later."
Spencer, he comes back into the room pointing at his plate with a fork, saying, "this is really good, dude," right as the door's shutting. "The fuck?"
"He said he's gonna go get some more groceries or something," Ryan says.
So Brendon's just turning the key in the ignition when Spencer slips into the passenger seat and pulls his seatbelt on. "I'm not letting you do my grocery shopping on your own," he says, simply.
"Oh," Brendon says. "Yeah. Good call. Man, let me do the shopping and you'd end up with, like. Real food and stuff, it'd be crazy."
"By real food, you mean lots of tater tots?"
"Tater tots are one of mankind's crowning achievements, shut up."
The rest of the drive is pretty quiet, and it's only as they're pulling into a parking space at the grocery store that Brendon says, "Wait, you seriously just left Ryan and Keltie at your place?"
"Yeah? They'll live without me."
"Dude," Brendon says.
"I do what I've gotta do," Spencer says. "And what I've got to do is protect my refrigerator from terrible decisions."
It's late, and the grocery store is all-but abandoned. There's oldies playing through tinny overhead speakers, not quite loud enough to drown out the buzz of the ancient yellowy lights.
"Yeah," Spencer says, examining a bruised apple. "I don't usually shop here, you know?"
"Yeah," Brendon says, and looks down at the depressing array of fruits and vegetables, then takes Spencer's wrist. Spencer shifts the apple to his other hand, sets it down, looks at Brendon. He's about to say something, has his eyebrows cocked up and his hips tilted just so, prepared to be clever should it become necessary. Brendon kisses him instead.
Spencer closes his eyes.
After a second, Brendon says, "We should probably. Uhm. Actually shop."
"Right," Spencer says, expression shutting down into forced neutral mode.
"And also make out in the car later."
Spencer laughs, so Brendon figures that's okay.
In frozen foods, Spencer grabs a bag of corn and tries to ignore how intently Brendon's studying the ice cream section. He wants to move on, but he doesn't really want to leave Brendon behind, so he keeps having to circle back. "Seriously, you don't need any sugar tonight."
"Every night is a good night for sugar," Brendon says.
Spencer says, "We're here to recover my losses. After you used all my food."
"It went to a good cause!"
"Feeding Ryan and Keltie," Spencer says.
"It was gonna be for you, dude."
"And you."
"Well, yes."
"They're not assholes, there'll be some left," Spencer says.
"But it'll be cold," Brendon says. "And I feel I need sugar and sweetness to make up for the ruination of my efforts."
"What the fuck?" Spencer says, with an incredulous laugh.
Brendon says, "Spencerrrrr." He shuffles his feet against the ground, placing himself soundly within Spencer's personal space. Spencer shifts his weight a little, raises his eyebrows as Brendon kisses his cheek. "Come on. I'll share. Sharing is caring."
Spencer snorts, and places a hand at the small of Brendon's back, pushing him forward just a little. "Whatever, dude, it's not like I'm going to pay for it. Get yourself some damn ice cream."
"You are the best, man," Brendon says.
-
When they get back, Ryan and Keltie are already gone, their dishes stacked clean next to the kitchen sink. Brendon says, "Hey, at least that was nice of them."
Spencer says, "Right, yeah, I hate when my best friend comes over to my place."
Brendon says, "It's only lame when I'm trying to seduce you."
"Is that what you were doing?" Spencer says.
"Well, yeah," Brendon says. "Mostly. That and I was really hungry." Brendon flops down on the couch, sprawling out. "Spence. Spence. Come cuddle."
"That works." Spencer sits down too, leaning up against Brendon. "So are we ever going to actually have dinner, or what?"
"I think make-outs come first, Spencer Smith." Brendon leans in to nip at Spencer's lower lip, grinning at him, eyes dark and narrow. They kiss close-mouthed for a little while, before Spencer shifts a little and Brendon parts his lips, at the same time letting out a sigh. He wriggles a little, making himself more comfortable. They fit nicely against each other, and Spencer is slow and responsive, one hand steady and solid on Brendon's upper arm. His beard, such as it is, is a little scratchy, but not unpleasantly so. Brendon says, "Pete was right."
"The fuck?" Spencer laughs, and takes the moment to move his arm to Brendon's side, tracing down his torso through the thin fabric of Brendon's shirt. "I've never made out with Pete, dude, so whatever he said --"
"No, no, dude, just that it's awesome being able to make out with your best friend." He continues quickly, "And I mean, I know I'm not your best friend, even though you're mine, but it's cool, I'm used to it."
"Yeah, well," Spencer says. "I don't want to make out with Ryan. So there." He kisses Brendon, a little more aggressive now that he's taking the initiative.
Eventually -- Brendon's not sure how much later it is -- Brendon says, "Hey, what time do you want to get up tomorrow?"
"I don't know," Spencer says. "Eventually. Is Jon getting back -- no, that's day after tomorrow. Alright, yeah, whenever."
"I'll wake you up if I get bored," Brendon says.
"Okay."
-
Brendon gets up early and makes coffee and toast with jam, which he leaves at the bedside in favor of straddling Spencer and kissing down his chest. He wraps a hand around the base of Spencer's cock, even though it's limp right now, and strokes it until its actually hard. Spencer cracks an eye open, making a soft sleepy little noise of confusion. Brendon shhes him, says, "Don't worry, I got it taken care of," with a little grin, and works his hand a little harder. He stops for a moment to spit in his palm again before quickening his strokes any.
Spencer, eyes still closed, groans and arches up a little into Brendon's hand.
-
Ryan's supposed to come over, only he gets -- stuck in traffic. Or something. Keltie shows up on her own anyway. Keltie says, "Way to bail the other day, guys."
"I needed groceries," Spencer says.
"He did," Brendon agrees. "Not as bad as I need to get Star Power, though, what the hell."
Keltie yawns, putting her arms behind her head. She's sitting on the couch, watching them play Guitar Hero. She's not particularly good at it, kind of prefers first person shooters on the occasions when she's talked into playing, so she's letting the two of them duke it out. Or play on cooperative, as it turns out.
Her phone buzzes, and she flips it open to read the text message. "Haha, Ryan saw a sale at Urban Outfitters. He's never going to show up." She says, "So, who're you guys getting to make the swans?"
"What -- the ice swans!" Brendon says.
Spencer says, "Dude, you're going to mess up. Pay attention."
"I've beat this song, like, a million times. Spencer. What are your thoughts on ice sculpture?"
"I don't know, I guess it's ... I don't know. I don't usually spend much time thinking about ice sculpture."
"Because we should have, like. Ice swans lining the aisle, dude, think about it."
Keltie says, "What, inside?"
Spencer says, "Do you guys know something I don't?"
"At the wedding, duh," Brendon says.
Keltie says, "You don't want the swans just melting on the floor."
"Right," Spencer says. "Because they're not going to melt in the fucking desert."
"We'd have it somewhere else, chill," Brendon says, then laughs. "Haha, chill. Somewhere cold. Where it's chilly."
"Right." Spencer says, "Somewhere cold. Like where?"
"Maine?" Brendon guesses. "They've got mountains up there, too; that's pretty awesome."
"Fucking Maine." Spencer laughs. "There's, like, moose in Maine."
"One of you could ride a moose down the aisle," Keltie says.
"I don't think the church would like it."
"We're not going to have any fucking moose at our wedding."
Keltie and Brendon both turn to stare at Spencer. "Dude, chill," Brendon says.
Spencer says, "I'm serious."
"That's what worries me," Keltie says with a laugh.
"Shut up."
"Come on, moose are pretty cool." Keltie says, "They're probably a little big for an indoor wedding, though, it's true."
"Can you train them?" Brendon says. "I want to train a moose. Have it as my pet."
"Live like a rockstar," Keltie says. "It's a lifestyle choice, owning a moose."
"Some people are cat people," Brendon says, waving a hand. "And some people are moose people. That's just the way of things. I don't know if this's gonna work out if you can't handle that."
Spencer says, "Is owning moose even legal?"
"I don't know," Brendon says.
"Keep it in your bathtub."
"That's alligators," Spencer says.
"We could get an alligator," Brendon says. "But I don't think you could ride it at our wedding."
"Maybe a tortoise," Keltie says.
"I don't want to die before the ceremony's over," Spencer says.
Eventually, Ryan calls again, and Keltie ends up leaving -- "It's been fun, guys, but I'm going to go -- well, you know, I'd tell you, but you're both single these days, right? So it'd be pretty unfair. We're going to go have a wholesome time playing Scrabble. Tournament rules."
"I hope you get all the triple word scores," Brendon tells her solemnly.
-
Brendon says, "So I was looking at, like, ice sculptors? And I don't know, I was emailing this dude."
"About ice sculptures," Spencer says.
"Yeah. Like, just, when he'd be up for doing that, you know. I figure cost doesn't matter too much; the album's doing good."
Spencer rolls his eyes, but -- if it was anyone else, he'd probably be freaking out, but it's been a year of holding hands and stealing moments to make out backstage at venues and sex when they have time for it, a year of Brendon and his stupid, what if we got tigers, Spencer? Like Siegfried and Roy! and Spencer talking him down to just hiring the Lucent Dossier dance troupe again. It only takes them a month and a half to tell everyone they're together -- everyone meaning the rest of the band and Pete, because Pete's good with the media and all. Ryan mostly just rolls his eyes at them and asks when they plan to stop being so sickeningly cute. They tell everyone, but never actually talk about it other than that.
Brendon butts his head against Spencer's chest, curled up next to him on his side, and says, "So I could show you pictures or something."
"Yeah, sure," Spencer says, stroking his thumb along the inside of Brendon's elbow. "Later, though. Right now, I don't wanna move. Fuck." He rolls onto his side, closing his eyes tight. "I'm glad that tour's over. Just. Fuck."
"Fuck," Brendon says agreeably. "We did good, though. You're my favorite member of Panic! at the Disco, Spence. Can I get your autograph? Like, omagawd."
Spencer says, "Oh, no, it's coming from inside the house."
"Haha, what?"
"The danger," Spencer says.
"Yes. I am going to assault you. Maybe put roofies in your food. You know."
"Would a lock of my hair pacify you? You could sell it on eBay or something when you grow out of your phase."
Brendon says, "Hey, you're not a phase. You're totally not a phase. You don't think you're a phase, right?"
"Uh," Spencer says.
"I mean, not that," Brendon says. "I mean."
"No," Spencer says. He sits up a little, leans over so he can press his forehead against Brendon's. The position is sort of awkward, and he's going a little cross-eyed trying to look at Brendon, but before he moves, he says, "Not a phase. It's okay."
"Right." Brendon says, "Okay, good."
-
Spencer's not one for nervous tics, but he's managed to chew his lower lip raw to the point where it's bleeding a little. Ryan's telling him about ... something. Spencer honestly has no idea what, except that it involves Dan Angel, Keltie, and a group of thirteen year olds who wanted their chests signed.
Spencer says, "So hey, anyway. Reason I stopped by."
"Oh, right," Ryan says.
"So I'm not asking for your opinion on this or anything; I'm just letting you know because you're my best friend, and you deserve to know."
"Go ahead and get the operation if it'll save your life," Ryan says solemnly.
"Yeah, Ryan, that is exactly what I was talking about. Surgery." He says, "No. Close. I'm going to ask Brendon something, like, I guess if he wants to marry me. Just warning you. Thanks. Bye."
Ryan says, "Wait, seriously?"
"Yeah." Spencer says, "See you later; I'm going to dinner pretty much right now."
-
Spencer says, "I'm thinking Vermont."
"That's pretty close to Maine, dude," Brendon says. "There's moose there too."
"Yeah, I know, but I figure they're an unavoidable danger if we want a northern winter wedding."
"It's an acceptable risk." Brendon narrows his eyes, nodding seriously. Then Brendon says, "So uhm."
Spencer makes a noncommital noise, and uses his chopsticks to pick up a piece of chicken. The waiter comes by, fills up their water glasses again, and disappears before Brendon can finish saying thanks.
Brendon ducks his head and goes back to his meal, poking at it ineffectively with his fork and knife, taking tiny bites and chewing very slowly.
"What's up?" Spencer finally asks. He drops one hand to his pocket, to make sure the little cardboard box is still there. He paid a friend to make a box, because he figured that'd be cooler than the box the jewelry store wanted him to use.
It takes Brendon a while to actually answer; he finishes chewing before saying anything. Spencer's not used to that, so he starts talking at the same time as Brendon.
"Because I was thinking maybe --"
"Like, shut me up if this is awkward or anything, but like, I kind of --"
Spencer says, "You go."
"Uhm," Brendon says. "You're not. Like. I know how it started out and all, and like, how we started out, but, uhm. I think maybe we should. Ditch the stupid marriage joke, I don't know."
"Oh," Spencer says. "Yeah. Yeah, right."
"Okay," Brendon says.
"Yeah, it's probably a good call." Spencer nods, and shoves his food around a little on his plate. He reaches out to take another dumpling from one of the communal dishes in the middle of the table. "Right."
"It's just," Brendon starts.
"Yeah, no, it's cool," Spencer says. "It's fine."
-
Keltie says, "Oh, oh, so Ryan here got me on the guestlist for Arctic Monkeys tomorrow? It's going to be so, so cool. Seriously." She laughs, nuzzling her face against Ryan's shoulder, then looks up, grins. "I'm not gonna have to make him get me on you guys's guest list, right?"
Spencer snorts, but doesn't say anything.
Brendon says, "Well, yeah, only it's not like we're actually getting married or anything. It was just some dumb joke or something, I guess."
"Yeah. It's getting pretty old," Spencer says. "So shut the fuck up. It wasn't even that funny."
"Spence, dude, chill out. Don't be a jerk to my girlfriend."
"No, dude," Spencer says. "I'm not going to be nice just because she's your girlfriend."
"The hell," Ryan says.
Keltie says, "Look, wow, you didn't have to freak out or anything."
"I'm not freaking out," Spencer says. "I'm just apparently the only one who knows when tired shit has been taken way too fucking far."
Brendon says, "Dude. Come on. The fuck?"
Spencer parrots him, voice mocking -- "Dude. Come on."
"Wow, uhm," Keltie says.
Ryan says, "So."
Keltie says, "How about the weather?"
"Sure is a nice day," Ryan says.
"Yup," Keltie says. "Perfect temperature."
"Definitely."
Spencer says, "I'm kind of tired; I'm going to skip the movie."
"Do you need a ride?" Brendon says.
"I can get a cab."
"Uhm," Brendon says. "Okay. Okay, uh, bye."
-
Brendon says, "Jon. I need advice."
"Yeah?" Jon says, "My advice is, don't leave the oven on if you're going on tour."
"Wow, what? What -- fuck, dude, did -- is your house okay?" Brendon says, "Fuck! Why didn't I hear about this?"
"No, nothing happened, I'm just giving you advice."
"Wow, thanks, Jon. Thanks."
"You're welcome."
"Seriously, though. Like. How did you get Cassie to think you weren't kidding when you asked her to marry you?"
"What? Why would she even --"
"Hypothetically."
"How did I hypothetically do something I actually did?"
"Yes."
Jon says, "I don't know that I can help you, little man."
Brendon says, "Jon Walker, you are hereby demoted. Way to be least coolest member of Panic! at the Disco."
"At least I'm cooler than Brent."
"I don't know ..." Brendon says, trailing off.
"Harsh."
"Like a Brillo pad to a shark."
"Uh, yeah, that," Jon says. "Hey, hold up a minute, Cassie's -- what? No, what is it? Just tell me, it's cool -- wait, what? Seriously? Brendon. I'm going to hang up on you now, okay?"
"Okay."
"Thanks," Jon says, and hangs up.
-
Jon says, "Spencer, you'd better not be asking for vague advice without explaining the situation."
"No. Can I come over for a bit?"
"Uh, sure, I guess; me and Cassie were about to watch a movie or something."
"If it's a bad time --"
"No, it's cool."
-
Nothing interesting happens at Jon's Vegas apartment, unless Spencer seeing 40 Year Old Virgin for the sixteenth time is interesting.
-
They play a little local show with The Cab that week -- tickets have been sold out since a month ago, when they decided to do it in the first place. It's a tiny venue, and with how many tickets were snapped up by scalpers then posted on Craigslist at over-high prices, the venue isn't as full as it could be. They even intentionally undersold, making sure the place wouldn't be at capacity, just because they wanted things a little more relaxed.
So Brendon goes out and sings with The Cab on one song, and one of the guys from The Cab comes on during Nine in the Afternoon to sing a verse, and -- really, it's mostly The Cab bringing the positive energy to the stage, even during Panic! at the Disco's actual set. Brendon's a little subdued, and Jon's just sort of confused, leaving it up to Ryan to try to carry the weight of the performance pretty much on his own.
It's an average show -- not great, not terrible, just acceptable -- but the crowd still screams for them to come back after they've left the stage, and Ryan says, "Fuck, I'm tired."
"Yeah, me too." Spencer stretches his arms out and cracks his knuckles.
"We could just do it acoustic," Jon says. "An acoustic encore. Spencer, all you'd have to do is play cowbell or something."
"I've got a fever --" Brendon starts.
"The only cure is more time at the disco," Jon says. "You have to dance 'till you can sweat it out."
"But I can't!" Brendon says.
Ryan just shakes his head and says, "You guys are pretty odd."
Brendon stares at him for a second before laughing, hard.
Spencer says, "Whatever, I guess we can do it; they still haven't shut up."
So they go back out, and the crowd goes wild, and Spencer feels appreciated, maybe. They've only discussed the first two songs they're playing for the encore, but one of the venue staff, when he looks over, gives them the thumbs up for more time, and Brendon's just stalling for time talking to the audience. Then he and Ryan and Jon huddle for a bit, while Spencer sits at his drum kit twirling his sticks. He idly tosses one out to the crowd, grabbing another one after he does. He takes a long drink from the water bottle sitting on the floor next to him.
Spencer can't even really kill time talking to the audience, because he doesn't have a mic on him. He's never been into talking to the crowd, even though he sometimes ends up carrying entire interviews, but the crowd's getting a little impatient and shouting shit out.
Finally Brendon wanders back, says, "We're gonna do that cover of 'July, July!', dude, that okay?"
Spencer nods, says, "Yeah, sure, so you wanna get married for real?"
"Yeah, sounds good," Brendon says. Then, "Wait, what?"
Spencer taps a stick against the metal edge of one of his drums, counting off the rhythm, and says, "Come on, crowd's waiting."
Brendon spends the song bouncing around the stage like a kangaroo on crack-cocaine, going back and forth between Ryan and Jon and constantly turning to grin at Spencer. He actually manages to keep his voice from going all over the place, too; the sound's good tonight and he can hear himself properly on the monitor, which is helping. Right before the song's over, he goes over to pause between verse and final chorus to kiss Ryan on the cheek, then gives Jon the same treatment.
He finishes singing, though, July, July, July, it never seemed so, never seemed so strange -- then, as the instrumentation drops out, and Ryan's still picking the last few notes on his guitar, Brendon announces into his microphone, "Okay, so actually the strangest thing is the part where I'm getting married. In case you all were wondering."
He doesn't kiss Spencer on the cheek before they get offstage, but he does kiss him.